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I can't think of many new trends that became prominent this year. It seemed to be mostly a continuation of the movements that have dominated the club scene post-pandemic. Mainstream techno keeps getting faster and harder, to the point that sets like this, which would have been seen as extreme even in the '90s, are now main stage festival fare. There have been some small scale reactions against this silliness, such as dub techno having one of its periodic breakouts through acts like Purelink, but they're barely scratching the surface.
Everywhere you look, '90s revivalism is still very much in fashion. Tempos are high, moods are euphoric, samples and remixes of classics are rife. The progressive trance stuff I'm mainly interested in has shown signs of going in a slightly more tribal direction in 2025 (history repeating once again) but nothing approaching the dominance that sound had the first time around.
The other big mainstream movement seems to be Afro House becoming more and more commercialised, less "afro" and more white and song-based. It's now reaching the point where you're hearing it infect the sets of people like Dave Seaman and Lee Burridge, much to the irritation of their fans.
Overall, it kinda feels like a sea change is imminent. We've been in this harder, faster, ADHD era of club music for over five years now and it's reaching the point where it's going to burn itself out. I wouldn't be entirely surprised to hear tempos start dropping again and things getting slightly deeper - there really isn't any other direction of travel left to go.
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Mixes:
> Maximum Elevation [Progressive House]
> DI.FM 26th Anniversary Guest Mix [Progressive House]
> Live @ Dance:Love:Hub London, 11.10.2025
> Higher Peaks [Progressive House]
> Dance:Love:Hub Afterparty (The Return) 23.11.24
Like these sets? Come see me play live at Kibosh in Manchester: https://www.instagram.com/kibosh.mcr/
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